Frost and Fire

 

Usually, our fears are directly proportional to the doubts we have.

A sword fighter has a beautiful wife. She is in awe of his reputation and is almost daunted by the force of his persona. She respects him, but love is missing in the secret chamber of her heart. As it happens, she falls in love with somebody outside her marriage. As if that is a small problem, to make it still worse the lover happens to be their servant.

Lies and deceit can be hidden, but love has the natural propensity to shine like the sun from behind the clouds. It comes to light. That is its nature. As per social norms, love usually stands out scandalous.

The offended husband challenges the servant for a duel, taking it for granted that he will surely kill the illicit lover, thus giving the opponent a painful death and earn more laurels for his swordsmanship as bonus. The deed will not reek of cold-blooded revenge and his motive to kill the servant will lie buried under the fair game of duel. So it is supposed to be a sure death for the poor servant.

The sword fighter hides his revenge and anger under the art and craft of his swordsmanship. Most importantly, he is sure of victory, because by the logic of it, how can it be otherwise, pitted as he is against a man who has so far merely picked up the scabbard from his master’s famed walls to clean it. And he being a master swordsman whose reputation chimes across the four corners of the state.

The servant is thus sure of his death. He has accepted his fate, death. When you are eying victory, you are also eying safety to yourself from the corner of your eyes. And you have fear also, because without that the sense of victory cannot sustain. With a sense of victory you just cannot be fearless. There is something to fight for and achieve and for that you have to remain alive. This breeds fear.

The servant, on the other hand, has accepted death and failure. His acceptance is hundred percent. He has no doubt about it. And when there is no doubt, you become fearless. The swordsman isn’t totally free from fear because his certainty about his victory falls short of the servant’s certainty of his defeat and death. He isn’t as sure of his victory as the servant is of his defeat.

So, irrespective of the fighting calibre, the servant is more fearless of the two, simply because he is under less doubt. In his fearlessness he decides to let loose all madness in him before his death. He doesn’t hate the opponent. He isn’t angry. His acceptance of death enables him to give all to life before death. The sword-fighter, on the other hand, cannot give all in the fight, because he is fighting to save respect, prolong life, take revenge, and all these with further expectations from life. Life itself means fear.

The offended husband takes manoeuvres as per the art of sword-fighting. In pre-death fearless madness, the lover strikes his sword as if he is striking with a stick. To all the conventional strokes of the sword-fighter, he hits back with the most awkward and unorthodox ones. Fearlessness in his eyes creates fear in the opponent’s eyes.

The servant kills the master! Why? Because he is sure of his death, and because the master isn’t that sure of his victory! How can he be? He simply cannot. He is fighting to save a lot of things and fighting to save things cannot allow you to be cent-percent fearless.